Buddha Baby Read Online Free PDF Page B

forgiveness, grace, and mercy. Or maybe she was just getting sick of seeing the same droopy Chinese kid every day. Either way, Lindsey was confident that Mary had her back. She, in turn, was eternally grateful.
    Stepping away from the painting now, Lindsey made a little sign of the cross, which she hadn't done in years. She then hurried to the main office, removed her coat, and stuffed it into the staff closet. She smoothed down her appropriately drab attire: a below-the-knee wool skirt, argyle stockings, and black oxford shoes. With her ponytail and fresh-scrubbed complexion, all she needed now was a peplum blouse with a peter pan collar to look like an abnormally large kindergartner who had flunked about twenty grades.
    She headed to the library for the Monday-morning staff meeting. Entering the spacious room, she squinted in the fluorescent light and selected an amaretto cookie from the tray of
    Italian pastries. Nibbling over a napkin, she stood in the corner, afraid to mingle.
    It was surreal enough to be standing once again in front of the bookcase where she had checked out many a Nancy Drew mystery. But it was even weirder to be surrounded by her childhood authority figures: Sister Boniface and Sister Constance were in the corner by the outdated globe; Mrs. Yee, the piano teacher, was teasing her wiglet with her long scarlet fingernails; Mrs. Mann, dean of the lower school, still looked exactly like a man; and Mrs. Grupico, the librarian-registrar, squatted like a bloated bullfrog behind her same old desk scarred by cigarillo burns.
    As intimidating as they still were, Lindsey noticed they all looked much older. Most had silver or white hair now, except for Mrs. Yee, whose wig was as black as a doll's. Also, they all seemed to have shrunken and looked like they could use blood transfusions and chocolate sundaes to give 'em a little pep. They each moved in slow motion, and Lindsey longed for a can of WD-40, since she could practically hear their bones creaking.
    So many years had passed since she was a student, she hoped they had all forgotten about the intercom incident. In eighth grade, Lindsey and a friend had gone to the office to make a student council announcement and had found the room empty. They pushed several buttons on the switchboard but couldn't figure out how to work it. As they waited for Mrs. Grupico to return and help them, they had joked around, unaware that they had inadvertently turned on the P.A. system and the entire school could hear their conversation over the intercom.
    "Don't you wish Patrick Swayze was your boyfriend?" her friend asked.
    "Are you kidding?" Lindsey screeched. "Is the Pope Catholic?"
    A second later she added, "Does a bear shit in the woods?"
    The girls erupted in peals of laughter, and a moment later when they caught their breath, Lindsey delivered a final punchline, "DOES THE POPE SHIT IN THE WOODS?"
    As their howls of merriment were broadcast in the teacher's lounge, throughout the halls, and in every classroom, Sister Boniface came charging through the office door and tried to grab their collars. The other girl, closer to the door, ran out so fast that Sister Boniface didn't get a good look at her. Lindsey was on the floor laughing so hard that she didn't see the small nun until it was too late. For the rest of the school year she was forced to clean the faculty toilets and had secured a reputation as a foul-mouthed perpetrator of hooliganism. A real enemy of the Vatican.
    Lindsey winced, recalling the incident. Thinking further, she supposed that everyone had thankfully forgotten about her eighth-grade antics, otherwise she probably wouldn't be standing here now with a job. She started to relax, and sipped weak coffee from a Styrofoam cup.
    But she cowered when she saw the next teacher who arrived. It was Ms. Abilene, her seventh-grade nemesis. Shockingly, although fifteen years had passed, the woman looked not one day older than when Lindsey was a student. She wore the same